"The latest entry in the series is a departure in both its visual design and overall mood -- decidedly darker than previous Wars. The change is bound to be jarring for longtime fans of the series. We are happy to report that the gameplay, however, hasn't changed, and the handheld strategy game appears as fun and addictive as ever."
I see it another way. The first Advance Wars DS was released more than two years ago, the DS's install base was much smaller. Vgchartz also does not include numbers from Europe or Australia, so you have to take that into account. Also, how do you know if they were more or less reliable for data back then? From all that I think that Advance Wars DS sold more than the figure Vgchartz has on their site.
For this game I don't think 800k+ is unreasonable. This game looks to shed the kiddie look of the past games and go for a more realistic look, something that will help it appeal to more people (especially those who pick up strategy games). I think this game will be marketed more heavily in Europe (than the last game), increasing numbers there (this game was first revealed at an event in Paris). The new features, especially WiFi support and the ability to upload created levels to a server, will greatly help this game when it comes to sales, if the features work out as promised this could be one of the better WiFi games, and adding online into any game helps it (the first Advance Wars DS did not have online support).
From all this I think that 800k+ sales over its lifetime don't seem unreasonable, the series already has a devoted following (I already know I'm going to pick this one up); this game has added many much needed features (WiFi support amongst others); this game has returned the series to its roots, gone are the over the top CO powers; it is being released after the holiday season, so it won't get lost in the crowd; and finally, the DS's install base has grown tremendously since the first Advance Wars DS game came out. This game should be 80DKP +.
VGChartz has the first DS iteration at 330k. Yeah, I know, VGChartz. This is actually more troubling since that site is historically bullish on its estimates.
The game is a niche genre as shown by the sales of the first iteration. A 100% increase over a most probably bullish figure is extremely doubtful.
Trading is now up, I will try to find solid data on the first Advance Wars DS game (in response to lstormy10's queries).
I have been a fan of Advance Wars for a long time now and this change of tone is welcome. I thought that the powers were getting out of hand (Dual-Strike ability was broken in some ways) and this return to realism is welcome. Listening to one of the interviews, you can see that Intelligent Systems thought so also. Hopefully they have some more features up their sleeve that they have not yet told us, but the minute I heard that you would be able to go online, upload maps and rate other people's maps I was sold. Hopefully you can finally have more than 3 maps saved at one point. Overall this is looking good, can't wait to hear more information.
This stock could end up as a nice buy opportunity depending on what the sales of Advance Wars: Dual Strike were (because of the added boost of Wi-fi to the sales of an Advance Wars title that is bound to happen), have you been able to find any sales numbers for Advance Wars: Dual Strike?
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